Another bad night's sleep despite reading until midnight. I finally nodded off about 8.00am and dozed through til lunchtime. Having got through on e-mail to the accomodation in Cucoa in Equador that Alex found, I ascertained that they wanted $30 (US) deposit, but the only way I could pay it was by PayPal. I confirmed the reservation and then went to make the payment and it was turned down. They stated that they wanted a direct payment from my bank. This takes about 3-5 days and at the end I'm fairly sure LloydsTSB will require a confirmation on my mobile, which they won't get because I have no network connection. (Seemingly there is only one network here called Moviestar. If you have GSM International Roaming, you can get connected. You have to go into your menu and do all sorts of things that I'm not even going to begin to try, so basically I'm sans mobile). I checked out a forum on the web and seemingly this non acceptance of credit cards is widespread by PayPal, but I failed to find any solutions. So I informed Alex of the situation and the hostel people, telling them we would just have to take a chance on the accomodation still being available when we got there. They replied that they would try to keep the room open for us without the deposit being paid.
I went out for another walk and this time found a shop with reasonable size travel bag for about £10. I think I may have trouble with my luggage weight on my travels in South America as I think they restrict me to 23Kg whereas the South African - Australia - New Zealand flights were 2 x 23Kg. However if I spread the load over two bags I may have a better chance, well see. I discovered that my flight to Easter Island leaves at 8.20am, which probably means leaving the hotel shortly after 6.00am. I don't know if Louis will still be so keen to pick me up! I've sent an e-mail to Robert asking him if he can ask Jeannette to phone the hotels in Easter Island and Lima and ask if they will pick me up from the airport. I've sent e-mail requests to both but haven't received a reply.
I'm amazed at the crowds that throng the streets in the centre of Santiago, seemingly all day. Most of the eating places are pretty busy as well. I bought some coffee, biscuits and cheese but couldn't find any "lece", so gave up and went to the "Inianapolis" again. This time they gave me a menu with English subtitles! I picked a soup to start with a sort of consomme with an egg thrown in - it wasn't bad. Then I had a "Bistec Milano" and asked for the mashed potatoes option. It consequently came with chips and so many I was unable to finish them all. All this washed down with a beer - the first one on the list - which turned out to be a dark beer. My back was still giving me grief, and all this walking had left me exhausted, so I returned to the hotel where I discovered I had a bit of a gyppy tummy. So all in all after a bath I turned in early again. But could I get to sleep, could I hell! The sun rises about 8.00am but you don't get to see it until about 9.00am
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